Vertical Ventures St Pete Climbing Gym

Published on 05/26/22: Here’s an activity in downtown St Pete where I saw all ages crushing it. I’m talking about Vertical Ventures, near Tropicana Field! Perfect for a cool summertime activity indoors.  If you’re unfamiliar, this is a huge climbing gym suited for the entire family, with 150+ routes to climb of varying difficulty. All of this across a 20K square foot facility! They also offer yoga and general fitness, more on that further down.

While we attended a 7 year old birthday party, Vertical Ventures was filled with climbers of all ages and skill levels. We didn’t know much going into it, simply that others spoke very highly of VV, with 650 Google reviews and a 4.7 average.

Vertical Ventures is a Community

Turns out, when you walk through the doors, you’re become part of the climbing *community*. And best part is, the other climbers are open arms for YOU to join their community. All you need is the desire to learn. As the Vertical Ventures website says: “a climbing gym owned and operated by climbers for climbers, VV maintains the ethos of respecting the culture from which we came — tied to nature and community (and a band of misfits)”.

To give you an idea of pricing, it’s $35 for the Intro to Climbing Class. This includes admission, all gear (shoes, harness, chalk), instruction AND a two week membership w/ gear! You could climb quite a bit in 2 weeks and determine if it’s for you. Then after that class, you could take the Intro To Movement class for $25, or $35 for non-members. When you see Vertical Ventures expansive setup, believe you’ll agree it’s reasonably priced.

Speaking of memberships, you have several options:

• Climbing + fitness (a gym attached to climbing facility) + Yoga is $62.50/month, pre-paid as $750 for the year.  That includes unlimited climbing, unlimited 1st time guest passes, fitness and yoga classes, discounted climbing classes and 10% of merchandise. There’s also a monthly option @ $75/month.
• If you’re mainly focused on climbing, you could for instance purchase a 10 visit pass for $130.

Once you’re comfortable, you can take all types of advanced lessons, including repelling, and even go for certifications.

*Must be 13+ years old to belay, though any age to climb.

We thoroughly enjoyed our time at Vertical Ventures, something different for sure! We will return!

Google Reviews: 651 reviews with a 4.7/5 Average

Address: 116 18th St S, St. Petersburg, FL

Phone: 727-304-6290

Website: Home – Vertical Ventures

Hours:

Monday 4pm – 10pm
Tues-Thurs 10am – 10pm
Friday 10am – 12am
Saturday 10am – 10pm
Sunday 10am – 6pm

Here’s a brief history of Vertical Ventures from their website:

“Tampa, Florida 1996. Adventure pioneer and visionary, Phil Yost built an environment for adventure junkies, climbing enthusiasts and misfits alike in a small warehouse with a bouldering cave, tire mulch flooring and roof climbing. This original clubhouse hosted many shenanigans as it introduced the sport of climbing to flat-landers, (Floridians).

In 2006 longtime climbers Hal and Christian purchased the gym and remodeled it themselves, replacing the tire mulch with carpet bonded foam and constructing a free-standing boulder for top-outs. Keeping the original fun-driven VV-spirit alive, they transformed the facility into a family-friendly environment, elevating the atmosphere and offerings. In 2015, the St. Pete location opened as a full-service climbing gym, roughly 4x the size of VVTampa.[…]”.

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